The right thing, not the shiny thing
I'll tell you the truth about what will actually serve your business — not the flashy option that's easier to sell. Honesty costs a little upfront and pays back tenfold.
Studio Bananas
Most consultancies sell you one piece — the marketing, or the automation, or the payments — and leave you to wire the rest together yourself. After three decades, I've learned how that story ends: a business handed one piece without the others behind it will struggle, then blame the wrong thing. Growth doesn't respect those borders. So I built a studio that handles the whole picture — one connected ecosystem, not four invoices.
I'm an industrial engineer and international business major, with a master's in strategic logistics — and, more to the point, over 30 years of business experience that ties it all together. The engineering gives me systems thinking; the international business background lets me read almost any business situation; the logistics master's sharpens how I move things from plan to done. I've run customer-care operations across the US and Canada, directed portfolio performance for telecom, financial, utility, and insurance clients, and built ventures from the ground up. The common thread: I love designing the strategy, then using technology to give it an edge.
I'm meticulous to a fault — a perfectionist about the details most people skip — but flexible enough to adapt the moment the ground shifts. That balance is what clients feel: rigor without rigidity.
I work across the Atlantic by design: the HQ is in Washington, D.C., while I'm based in Bilbao, Spain. That vantage — plus being trilingual — lets me serve clients across the US, Europe, and Latin America, and bring patterns from one market to bear on another.
Studio Bananas is where it comes together — a senior team and trusted partners across marketing, AI, payments, and capital. Small by design. Senior by default. No agency tax.
Read Francis’s full story →I'll tell you the truth about what will actually serve your business — not the flashy option that's easier to sell. Honesty costs a little upfront and pays back tenfold.
Winning a client is the easy part; keeping one is the work. I'd rather earn the next five through a job done right than chase the quick win that closes ten doors behind it.
Marketing, AI, payments, and capital only work together. I build the ecosystem so no single fix gets blamed for what the rest of the chain was never set up to support.
The advisor worth keeping flags trouble before, during, and after — in writing, nothing under the rug. You're paying for honest judgment, not applause.
Industrial engineering, UVG. Where the systems thinking started — process, measurement, and the habit of optimizing everything.
Cultural Attaché, Embassy of Guatemala. Promoting a country through marketing — my first proof that strategy and storytelling move people.
Co-founded Studio Bananas Group. Chairman ever since — the home base for the brand and marketing work that became the studio.
Director of Operations, Pacific Oak Capital Management. Ran portfolio performance across telecom, financial, utility, and insurance clients — operations and finance at scale.
Launched FST Customer Care Solutions. Customer-care operations across the US and Canada — proof that good process is itself a growth engine.
Built the SB family. SB Marketing, SB Intelligence, SB Financial, and SB Capital — marketing, AI, payments, and financing under one roof.
Co-founder and Senior Graphic Designer of Studio Bananas Group — and the studio's source of inspiration. Trained at Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala and formerly a designer for the City of Guatemala, she has delivered countless logos and identities across Guatemala, the United States, and Europe.
Her sharp eye and dedication have shaped everything SBG looks like today — including the mark that becomes particles when this site loads.
Head of SB Financial, Juan Carlos brings over 20 years of corporate finance leadership across multinational and regional groups in Latin America — treasury, FP&A, capital structuring, and investor relations, reported straight to Boards and Investment Committees.
He's stepped beyond the CFO chair twice, serving as interim CEO at both a real estate development group and a regional medical distributor. He's the one called in when a family-run business needs to professionalize its finance function without losing what made it work.